Buying Time
by JoBelle
Summary: What if Doyle had been there during to Shanshu in La or why Cordelia held out until Angel got back. This is the follow up story to "Without Him"


Title: Buying Time  
Author: Jobelle/Jodie  
Email Adress: jod21@tstt.net.tt  
Disclaimer: They're not mine and if they were I wouldn't kill them off *pout*  
Spoilers: All the eps in season 1 till "Hero" and MAJOR ones for "To Shanshu in LA"  
Author's Notes: If you haven't seen Hero and To Shanshu in LA, you're basically lost with this fic which takes place during To Shanshu in La, while Angel is off rescuing the words of Anatole from Lindsey and chopping off lawyer boy's hand.  
  
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"C'mon Princess, look at me!" Doyle pleaded. He paced the room anxiously. Fat lot of good all that begging the powers to send him to help her had done. He was here and what could he do? Nothing! She couldn't even see him! Doyle sighed heavily and shook his dark head. He paced the room, muttering curses under his breath at certain powerful beings that were extremely unhelpful, glancing at Cordelia's still form, her distressed whimpers tearing at his heart. Sitting on the bed beside her, he drew her head onto his lap and stroked her mussed chestnut hair away from her face.  
  
  
"Shh...shh...shh Delia." He whispered to her tenderly running a finger down her cheek, Cordelia's eyes were staring right at him but not seeing him, much as she'd done for the past six months. But now, now she should be able to see him, the PTB was finally allowing him to become visible to her and yet her eyes looked right through him, like he wasn't even there. And to her, he wasn't, no one was. She saw only the world inside her head, the visions of all those who cried out in need tormented her, coming one right after the other until she was sure she'd go mad and yet still they kept coming. The terror, the helplessness, the pain, she saw and felt it all again and again and again and he felt it too. Her visions were his after all, because they belonged to him in the first place. He watched her whimper in fear and flinch away from his touch and once again cursed the Powers for allowing this to be done to her, putting her in a place to go through this all the while also being thankful he was being allowed to help her.  
  
He had never meant to pass on his 'gift' to her that night and had felt guilty every time she had one afterward but this…this he could not stand. She was in pain, in threat of her sanity as well as her life and it was all his fault. All his fault. He had gone to the Oracles and begged them, begged them to let him go to her, to help her and for once they'd listened to him. Allowing him to materialize before her and what good was it now?  
  
The visions were awful, so terrible the average person would have succumbed and retreated into their subconscious letting the madness take them into blessed oblivion but Cordelia Chase was far from average. She was the most remarkable young woman he had ever met, yet remarkability only went so far and Doyle could feel her retreating into that safe place in her mind and he knew Angel would be too late to save her, by the time he got here the thin cord holding her to this place would have snapped, but he had to try to convince her to hold on for that long, had to convince her that it would all end soon, had to believe that she could hear him, that the reason she hadn't completely lost it was that she could hear him promising her it would all be okay and so he crooned mindlessly on, begging with her, pleading with her, to hang on just a little bit longer, just a little bit longer.  
  
  
The door to the room swung open abruptly startling Doyle badly, his presence there startling the nurse just as badly. "I'm sorry sir, but no one but family is allowed in here at this time." She told him not unkindly. Doyle stammered a bit before telling the nurse he was family, he was her fiancé, coloring brightly upon saying the words imagining Cordy's outraged expression were she to remember hearing them, if she were actually able to hear what was going on around her. Considering the fact that he could've heard what was going on around him during normal visions and he was pretty sure she could as well he felt it reasonable to think she might be able to hear him now and was almost grateful he wouldn't have to face her wrath once she remembered.  
  
Nurse Owens smiled at the young man sitting on the bed next to her patient, he seemed rather shy they were probably newly engaged, it was a real shame what had happened to the girl, she obviously had a lot to live for if this young man and her boss who had been here earlier were anything to go by. She nodded at him and stepped over to the monitors to take readings for this hour, not much change she noted sadly but that was to be expected with the drugs they were using to sedate her.  
"If you're planning on sitting with her, I don't think the drugs will be wearing off for a while you could undo her restraints." She suggested receiving a look of infinite gratitude from those tormented blue-gray eyes.  
  
He nodded and she turned to leave, the door was barely shut by the time he'd finished undoing her hands. He'd hated that she'd been restrained even though he knew it was for her own good when she came in, he'd still hated it. Sliding into bed with her, he wrapped his arms around her drawing her to him, tucking her head snugly beneath his chin, then he began to hum, a long forgotten lullaby his Grandmother used to sing to him when the monsters attacked him from under his bed. Before he'd known the monsters were real and that he himself was one of them. It was a quiet wordless old Irish tune that had been old when his grandmother was a girl and her own gran had sung it to her. He interspersed the melody with pleas for her not to give up and calming words when her whimpered cries rose.   
  
"Angel's coming Princess, he'll be here soon luv, and then all this will go away, you just have ta hang on until then okay? Come on, I know you can do it. Where's that old Chase fighting spirit hey? You can beat this darlin', I know you can. Just hold on a little bit longer. Just a little bit." He whispered into her hair, dropping a kiss on top of her head.   
  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
  
"Angel..." Cordelia murmured.  
  
"Hey, hi. How you feeling?" He asked squeezing her hand gently. It had been a day and a half since he had chopped off Lindsey's hand in order to save the words of Anatole and end her vision curse. A day and a half and the doctors were finally satisfied that she wasn't going to have a relapse of whatever it was that had hit her and were releasing her to Angel's care.   
  
"Ready to go home?"  
  
"I should certainly hope so considering the atrocious amount of paperwork I just filled out!" Wesley exclaimed entering the room, Nurse Owens in tow with a bag, which she handed to Cordelia. "The clothes you were brought in with dearie, I didn't think these two boys would have thought to bring you any and it wouldn't be fun to ride home in that hospital gown, even if your fiancé would enjoy it."  
  
"Fiancé?" Cordelia and Angel queried in unison.  
  
"The blue eyed young man with the Irish accent who sat with you yesterday," the nurse explained slowly watching Cordelia's expression turn extremely confused. The girl turned to shoot a pained look at the tall man in black next to her who just returned her look with equal bafflement.   
  
"Maybe I was mistaken, a different patient perhaps." Nurse Owens tried wondering if she'd simply dreamt the man up.  
  
"Probably." Cordelia replied stiffly, accepting the bag from her and pulling the curtain on the opposite end of the room to change behind.  
  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
  
Cordelia and Angel sat at her kitchen table a long time that night after Wesley had retired to his own apartment. "So…big news this Shanshu-ing thing." Cordelia broke the companionable silence they had been sitting in first. "When ya gonna call Buffy and tell her?" She queried.  
  
"I'm not." Angel replied.  
  
"What?!" Cordelia sputtered   
  
"Cordelia, we have no guarantee that this thing is going to happen in the next couple years, we don't even have a guarantee that it'll happen in your or Buffy's lifetime for that matter. I'm not going to make her wait around for something that may or may not happen." Angel said resignedly. Cordelia opened her mouth as if to argue then closed it again, dropping her gaze to the mug in her hands. She stared into the chocolaty liquid quietly for a few minutes before nodding slowly in acquiescence of his point. Looking up she caught his tortured gaze and rested her warm palm on top of his cold one in silent comfort.  
  
They sat like that for ten minutes before she spoke once again. "Angel…what do you think that nurse meant? In the hospital, about the Irish guy with blue eyes…"  
"You mean do I think it was Doyle?" he clarified.  
Cordelia dropped her eyes and nodded once, struggling to keep her tears at bay.  
"Honestly Cordelia, I have no idea. She might really have been mistaken and confused you with another patient. I guess we'll never know..." He said quietly turning his hand over to grasp hers. The girl nodded again and after a few seconds rose from the table.   
"I think I'm going to try and get some sleep now." She announced, keeping her head bent so her curtain of chestnut brown locks hid her expression, but it couldn't hide the hint of tears in her voice, especially not from vampiric hearing.  
"Cordelia…" Angel called stopping her in the doorway. "We'll save them." He promised. "All the ones Doyle died for us to save. We'll save them all."   
Angel's second seer nodded, her eyes bright with unshed tears. "Yeah, we will." She agreed. "Goodnight Angel." She wished with a small smile before leaving the room.  
  
  
~*~*~*~*~*~*~  
  
  
Cordelia Chase tossed restlessly in her bed that night, her sleep troubled by memories of her visions. The sheets on the bed tangled around her limbs as she tossed and turned in her sleep, her chestnut tresses splayed out on the pillow behind her, the frown on her face illuminated by the moonlight that entered through the gauzy curtains at her window. Suddenly, through that window came a warm breeze, almost like an exhalation of breath, that swept through the room and instantly quieted Cordelia's whimpered cries. The sheets straightened and were tucked snugly around her by an invisible hand, the hair stroked lightly off her forehead, smoothing the frown lines there as well, allowing her the peace she so sought. Memories colored her dreams again, but memories of being cradled in someone's arms, being comforted and sung to, someone who spoke with a light brogue and had the most gorgeous blue eyes. In the morning when she awoke those memories would stay with her and comfort her, allowing her to make it through the day helping the hopeless once more.  
  
  
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Fini  
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End file.
